This song is by Mana (the last letter in Mana has an accent on it, but I haven't figured out how to include accents and tildes when I'm typing yet.) Mana is a group from Mexico who have a huge following. They're one of my favorites too.
This song, aside from being both very easy on the ears and slow enough to follow without too much effort, uses subjunctive verbs quite a bit. Do you remember what the subjunctive is? It's typically used to show that a situation isn't real or isn't possible. In English, we tend to use a past tense verb to indicate present tense unreal/impossible (subjunctive) situations, for example "if I were you..." and "if I had a million dollars..." Did you ever notice that the verb is in the past even though those expressions talk about the present (or even the future)?
This song uses the subjunctive form of the verb QUERER (to like, to love, to want). You might already use this verb to say things like Yo quiero comer (I want to eat), or No quiero mas tarea (I don't want more homework.) When querer is put into the subjunctive, in addition to taking the subjunctive ending -iera, it also changes its base form from quer-/quier- to quis-. So quisiera means I would like, I wish.
You might be asking, "But can't it also mean he/she/you would like? And the answer is yes, because the 1st person singular (yo) form and the 3rd person singular (el, ella, Ud.) form are the same in the subjunctive, so in theory quisiera also can mean he/she/you would like, but that's not what it means in this song.
The other word that is helpful to think a little bit about is como how (again, once I figure out how to put in accent marks in this blog, I'll put an accent on the first o). You probably use this a lot in questions, just like we do in English: Como estas? How are you? But did you know can use it to show strong feelings, also like in English? In English you might normally say "I'd like a hamburger," but if you're reeeeaaaaaaally hungry, you might get very dramatic and say "Oh, how I would love a hamburger!!!" Like I said, if you're *very* dramatic.
In this song they use the phrase "Como quisiera...." which translates "Oh, how I would like to..."
Here is a link to a version of the song which gives you the lyrics in Spanish as well. Listen to it and just enjoy the sounds the first time.
Vivir Sin Aire (con palabras)
Here is a link to the song with an English translation. There are minor problems with the translation, but they don't really interfere with the meaning.
Vivir Sin Aire (palabras en ingles)
If you're very curious, here is a link to Mana's official video for the song:
Vivir Sin Aire (video official)
And if you'd like to hear a slightly more rock version of this song, here is a link to Julieta Venegas (She rocks! I'll do a post on one of her songs soon.) singing it with Mana.
Vivir Sin Aire (Julieta Venegas con Mana)
I hope you enjoy this song and learned a little about Spanish from it and from this post.
